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Diskussion:IWN Archiv: Der Putschsommer
Ein Herz für Johnson Eine höchst amüsante und spannende Geschichte. Aber den alten Lyndon Baines zum tumben, rassistischen Diktator zu machen ist nicht fair gegenüber der zu Grunde liegenden historischen Person. Klar, wenn wir Europäer an Johnson denken, denken wir zunächst bloss an Vietnam. Aber man darf nicht vergessen, dass schon unter Kennedy, die Zahl der Waffenlieferungen und "Militärberater" nach Südvietnam ernorm aufgestockt und ein Krieg in Betracht gezogen wurde. Die Ansicht, dass Kennedy den Vietnamkrieg verhindert hätte, ist recht umstritten. Vor allem muss man aber berücksichtigen, dass Johnson innenpolitisch einer der bedeutensten US-Präsidenten aller Zeiten war, der in Sachen Wahlrecht, Gesundheitswesen, Sozialsystem, Erziehungswesen, Umwelt, Ernährung, Verbraucherschutz und Bürgerrechten viel geleistet hat. Insbesondere der Gun Contral Act, der Social Security Act von 1965, der Voting Rights Act, die Civil Rights Acts von 1964/1968 und die Ernennung von Thurgood Marshall zum ersten afroamerikanischen Richter des Obersten Gerichtshofs sind Meilensteine der Ära Johnson. "But even if we pass this bill, the battle will not be over. What happened in Selma is part of a far larger movement which reaches into every section and state of America. It is the effort of American Negroes to secure for themselves the full blessings of American life. Their cause must be our cause too. Because it is not just Negroes, but really it is all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And We Shall Overcome. As a man whose roots go deeply into Southern soil l know how agonizing racial feelings are. I know how difficult it is to reshape the attitudes and the structure of our society. But a century has passed, more than a hundred years, since the Negro was freed. And he is not fully free tonight. It was more than a hundred years ago that Abraham Lincoln, a great President of another party, signed the Emancipation Proclamation, but emancipation is a proclamation and not a fact. A century has passed, more than a hundred years, since equality was promised. And yet the Negro is not equal. A century has passed since the day of promise. The time of justice has now come. I tell you that I believe sincerely that no force can hold it back. It is right in the eyes of man and God that it should come. And when it does, I think that day will brighten the lives of every American. For Negroes are not the only victims. How many white children have gone uneducated, how many white families have lived in stark poverty, how many white lives have been scarred by fear, because we have wasted our energy and our substance to maintain the barriers of hatred and terror? So I say to all of you here, and to all in the Nation tonight, that those who appeal to you to hold on to the past do so at the cost of denying you your future. This great, rich, restless country can offer opportunity and education and hope to all: black and white, North and South, sharecropper and city dweller. These are the enemies: poverty, ignorance, disease. They are the enemies and not our fellow man, not our neighbor. And these enemies too, poverty, disease and ignorance, we shall overcome. An American problem.“ Auszug aus Johnson Rede nach den gewaltsam niedergeschlagenen Selma-nach-Montgomery-Märschen 217.7.17.165 07:35, 1. Dez. 2010 (UTC)